Familiarity may breed winning for Belarus

Originally published on IIHF.com in 2002

By Lucas Aykroyd

Everyone has a comfort zone. In Team Belarus’s case, this appears to involve playing hockey against other former Eastern Bloc countries. The Belorussians may have tumbled down to Division I of the World Championships, but they can still take a bite out of their neighbors.

Just ask Ukraine, who lost 1-0 after being outshot 30-17 by the men from Minsk in their Olympic opener February 9 at The Peaks.

Belarus plays the old Soviet style, albeit with considerably less panache and finish. Eight of its players were born in the 1960’s, and it’s more difficult to execute a high-speed passing game on older legs.

Belarus’s biggest-ever margin of victory came in an August 1996 tournament in Riga, Latvia, where they pulverized Lithuania 21-1. They also thrashed Estonia 16-1 and Hungary 13-1 before settling for a modest 4-1 win over the host country.

They haven’t played a tournament in August since. From the standpoint of offensive production, they should definitely lobby to participate in the 2004 World Cup, which should kick off in the final days of summer.

Seriously speaking, Belarus plays with more confidence against other teams whose style is similar. For instance, heading into the 2001 IIHF World Championships, hockey nations against which the Belorussians enjoyed a winning or even record included Latvia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Poland.

Although neither France nor Switzerland ever fell behind the Iron Curtain, both teams should be beatable for Belarus in the remainder of this Olympic Preliminary Round. Despite their higher ranking, the Swiss dropped a 5-3 decision to Belarus at the 2000 World Championships, and France lost 4-0 when the teams clashed in their opener at Nagano.

The Belorussians are unlikely to get themselves a “comfortable” opponent if they qualify for the Final Round. They achieved that feat in 1998 but were promptly pounded by Canada. Patrick Roy posted a 5-0 shutout as captain Eric Lindros scored two goals and rocked defensemen Igor Matushkin and Oleg Romanov with big hits. Losses to the USA and Sweden followed before their elimination in the first game of the Playoff Round by Russia.

To make it to Salt Lake City, Belarus finished second in a qualification tournament in Norway in 2001, going undefeated against Ukraine (2-2), Germany (1-1) and Norway (7-3).

The only one of the Big Six nations that Belarus has ever beaten is (you guessed it) Russia. They pulled off a 1-0 shocker at the 2000 Worlds on a goal by ex-NHLer Vladimir Tsyplakov, who commented afterwards: “I used to play for Russia, and this is one of the reasons this win was special for me today.”

So it’s reasonable to suspect Belarus would enjoy another battle with the Russian Bear. If it happens, they’ll just have to try to match them, Sergei for Sergei and Igor for Igor.